


Homecoming

by echoinautumn (maybetwice)



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Arranged Marriage, F/M, First Meetings, Post-Canon, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-27
Updated: 2012-04-27
Packaged: 2017-11-04 10:36:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/392910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maybetwice/pseuds/echoinautumn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sansa arrives in Highgarden to see what is to be her new home and meets her betrothed for the first time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Homecoming

**Author's Note:**

> A fill for [this prompt](http://asoiafkinkmeme.livejournal.com/1704.html?thread=95400#t95400) at asoiafkinkmeme on LJ: "Sansa/Willas Tyrell - Sansa makes it to the Highgarden after all." 
> 
> This is the fluffy, non-porny fruit of an afternoon's leisurely labor, but I think that it has some implied promise of things to come.

On the horizon, the towers of Highgarden look to Sansa like the stalks of flowers stretching into the sky, a great blossom opening to the springtime sky. The sight does not steal her breath, though it might have only a few years before, when she was still but a child. It is beautiful, of course, and Sansa does her duty by coming here, but it is not the high towers of Winterfell, framed in snow and steel-colored clouds, which she cried to see when she first came home. Ahead of her is much of her guard, provided by the Queen to be certain this political transaction takes place. Behind her is the rest of the procession and the gifts of the North to her husband-to-be. 

At eighteen, Sansa has grown into the beauty of her birthright, tall and gifted with all the womanly graces that her mother once held. And, like her mother, she is certain she will spend her life among strangers longing for another home. 

The sound of hooves nearer than the rest of the procession rouses Sansa from her reverie, and when she looks up, she sees the scarred face of Loras Tyrell beside her, looking up at the towers of Highgarden with the same kind of longing Sansa feels for Winterfell. It already feels as if she has been away from Winterfell at least as long as her five years away, though she departed Winterfell mere weeks before. 

“Ser Loras,” she greets and shifts in her saddle. “I am honored to be delivered to my betrothed by the honorable man who is to be my goodbrother.”

For a moment, Loras meets her eyes and Sansa spies the remnants of his grief before he looks away again. She thinks she sees the corners of his mouth pull slightly upward, but Loras is looking toward Highgarden once more before he speaks.

“As my sister will have told you at great length, our elder brother is a good man. I have no doubt that you will be very happy in Highgarden, Lady Sansa.”

That is yet to be seen, but Sansa is too kind to say so, and they are near enough now to the castle that she can see the group riding out to meet them on the road. As they come nearer, she is stunned to recognize the thrice-widowed and still pure Margaery at the head of the group, and behind her a man with the same attractive Tyrell features as Margaery and Loras. There is a Tyrell banner flying above their group, unfurling and snapping on the same spring wind that carries the banner of House Stark.

Loras rides ahead to greet his siblings, but within moments, Sansa is facing the Lord of Highgarden and his entourage with nothing but a few of her brother’s remaining bannermen and a collection of knights and a straight back. 

Willas greets his younger brother with a nod, but ignores all other pleasantries to bring his horse up to Sansa’s. She can see the scars from the wars, the famed burn on his arm when he had defended Highgarden from white-walkers, and the slight twist in his leg from his famous loss to Oberyn Martell. 

“Lady Sansa,” he says with more warmth than she thinks anyone could bear to manage in these years. Though Sansa has not been foolish enough to place any faith in romantics for many years, her heart speeds just a little. Willas takes the hand she extends without thinking and kisses her knuckles with soft lips and the rough brush of auburn stubble the same color as his shining hair. 

Sansa hears herself say, “It is a pleasure, Lord Tyrell,” but she hasn’t any idea where her manners are coming from. Her voice is warmer than it has been in a long time, certainly since she departed Winterfell. Moreover, she is not in full control of herself, relying only on habit and as few words as possible to mask her racing heart and the cynical spiral of her thoughts that he cannot be so kind as he seems, and she knows that. 

Around them, her guard mixes with his entourage, and the two of them are left with the respectful space of the betrothed. Belatedly, Sansa realizes that Willas is still gently holding her hand, looking at her with an earnestly unguarded expression, as eagerly curious about her as Sansa is wary of him and every other man. 

“Welcome to Highgarden,” Willas continues with a sparkle in his gold-green eyes and a smile dancing close to blooming on his lips. He clasps her hand in his and pulls his horse alongside hers with the practiced hand of a horseman, and Sansa shifts her weight, first away, and then toward him. As they process toward the castle, when her guards are chatting with one another with the renewed vigor that comes with arriving at their destination and Sansa feels as far from them as if they two were sequestered in a tower, Willas leans close enough to speak to her privately. Her stomach twists in anticipation, both excitement and habitual terror, but his hands are gentle and calloused from some work other than war or intrigue, something more honest.

Sansa begins to fear irrationally that everything she has heard of him is utterly true. And if that is true, that she might come to love him in the vulnerable way that endangers her determined will to protect herself. All the same, she leans toward him deliberately now, and wills her heart not to leap too high when she _hears_ his smile when he speaks.

“I know Highgarden is very different than Winterfell. I hope you will come to love it so well as I do,” Willas murmurs near the plain braid of hair draped over her shoulder, and Sansa is frighteningly aware of her romantic heart thawing with every pulse and every word from his lips. His hand squeezes hers privately, and she looks up from the road to meet his eyes, forgetting discretion and lessons in intrigue. 

“I think that I will,” she says, and then Sansa smiles for him as honestly as she knows how.


End file.
